Night's Fall
by Australian Chaos
Summary: One-shot. A notable mare witnesses the downfall of Equestria as we know it, lamenting on what has just been lost as she flees. Could develop into a larger story with enough feedback.


**Night's Fall**

The cloaked equine looked back over her shoulder as she reached the crest of the hill, panting for breath, her cheeks stained with half-dried tears as she looked back at the subtle, but horrific sight she had been fleeing from.

There, high up on the sheer face of the mountainside, lay the majestic city of Canterlot...the capital of the land of Equestria. The many towers reaching for the stars, and the way a large portion of the city jutted out from the cliff-face, literally suspended high above the fields of Equestria, was a marvel of both engineering and magic. It was a place of sophistication and class, where freedom and tolerance had been the order of the day under the gentle guidance of Equestria's eldest Princess and primary ruler; Princess Celestia.

But as the young mare's cyan eyes took in the city from a distance, fresh tears formed at the horrifying reality that freedom and tolerance could no longer be associated with Canterlot...or Equestria, for that matter. The city, and soon, the whole land, would be a place of oppression and tyranny.

Nopony, not even the mare, could understand what had gone so horrifically wrong. It was started innocently enough, with Princess Celestia making a few new laws. Nothing too severe, and she had explained to all the Earth Ponies, Pegusi, and Unicorns, that the laws were for their own security and safety, and so nopony argued against them, took it all in stride and continued about their daily lives.

But as time continued to pass, the laws got more and more oppressive, and rapidly. It was not long before Princess Celestia's younger sister, and co-ruler, Princess Luna, finally decided to stand up, and question Celestia's new leadership style, which was not like her elder sister at all.

But Princess Luna's attempt to confront her sister had triggered today's events...and fall of Equestria as everypony knew it. Within hours of the confrontation, Celestia's Royal Guard had spread throughout the city, imposing martial law and ruthlessly capturing and holding anypony who resisted them. Several of the more stubborn residents of Canterlot had been killed as a result of their failure to comply with the guards orders as the city was literally sealed off, and more Royal Guards sent to continue this crackdown right across Equestria.

The mare on the hill watched with teary eyes as another squadron of Pegasus Guards flew out to oversee the crackdown, flying off to Manehatten or Fillydelphia or some other city that would soon succumb to Celestia's new, tyrannical ways. Already, those who opposed this new leadership had given the Princess of the Sun a new name; Solar Flare. It seemed fitting, all things considered.

"Why, Celestia...?" the mare on the hill whispered, talking to nopony in particular. "What happened to you? What went wrong?" The mare was certain, despite various rumours, that Princess Celestia had not become an overnight tyrant of her own free will...it just made no sense. Was she possessed? Was somepony else pulling the strings from the shadows, somehow manipulating the Princess like a live puppet?

One way or another, though, the mare knew that Equestria would never be the same again. Even from this distance, she could see flickering orange lights scattered throughout Canterlot, where fires were burning, either from the heavy-handed actions of the Royal Guards, or from the protestors still trying to put a quick end to Solar Flare's reign. Either way, though, the mare knew resistance efforts were currently fruitless. Solar Flare's Royal Guards had numbers and training on their side, and Princess Luna's Royal Guards had been very quickly disbanded earlier that day.

The mare also knew that there would be no help from the six ponies who were responsible for saving Equestria on multiple occasions...the famous Bearers of the Elements of Harmony, six magical artifacts that, legend has it, were the most powerful magical artifacts in Equestria. The Elements of Harmony themselves, having been under Princess Celestia's personal guard at the time of the revolt, had been taken by her most trusted guards and advisors, and scattered all across Equestria. Nopony knew exactly where, but the mare knew it had happened when she had heard rumours of ponies seeing guards flying off carrying strange objects. Nopony had been able to describe the objects in detail, only that there appeared to be six of them, and all appeared to be made of gold.

As for the Element Bearers themselves, very few ponies knew exactly who they were. The mare believed, though, that if they had not done so already, the six brave young mares would soon be going into hiding. She was certain those six would be targeted by Solar Flare within hours of this rise to power.

"Ma'am?" the tense, yet regulated voice cut through the mare's thought train, making her turn to its source...a dark-coated male wearing midnight blue armour, and oddly, possessing bat-like wings, as opposed to the usual feather wings all pegusi possessed. The wings were a product of magic, and one of the defining feature of the Night Guardians, Princess Luna's personal bodyguards.

The mare's cloaked rippled and swirled briefly, before turning into a swarm of bats that flitted around her for a moment, before vanishing into thin air. The pony underneath had a coat of dull sapphire, which extended to her large, feathered wings and long horn, both together identifying her as an alicorn. Her mane and tail her both cobalt blue, semi-translucent, and seemed to ripple majestically in a non-existent breeze. On her flanks, she had a large marking, depicting a white crescent moon over a splotched, midnight blue background. Her cutie mark, a distinctive one, that identified the mare as the Princess of the Night herself; Luna.

"Ma'am, we really must be moving now," the Night Guardian repeated, coming up beside Luna. "It's not safe to stay here, Your Highness...we have to go into hiding."

Luna stared at Canterlot for a few more moments, trying to commit the peaceful city she had once known and loved to memory, as well as lamenting on her sister's sudden rise to power one last time, before turning around and nodding. "Please, Captain...just call me Luna from now on. I'm no longer a Princess..." she added, her voice having a sad, almost defeated quality to it.

The Captain shook his head. "If you insist of having me call you Luna, it's only fair that you call me Night Rider. And you'll always be a Princess, Luna...the true Princess, now that Solar Flare has done this. But come on...we need to hide. Only then can we start forming a resistance."

Luna nodded softly once more, before turning to her personal guards. These bodyguards were all that was left of the Royal Night Guard, which, before all this, had been rather numerous, even if their numbers paled in comparison to Celestia's Royal Guard. "Listen, all of you. It is going to be very dangerous around me from now. I am one of Solar Flare's primary targets...anyone seen associating with me is going to be in just as much danger." In recent weeks, Luna had made an effort to improve her understanding of Equestria's society. Spending a thousand years on exile on the moon had left her rather behind the times. Her speech had seen the most impressive and rapid improvement. She still slipped into her old habits from time to time, but for the most part, sounded relatively modern.

She lowered her horn, and with a burst of pale blue magical energy, all of the half-dozen or so Night Guardians no longer wore their distinctive armour, and their wings had once more turned back into normal feathers, making them look like very tough, but otherwise normal pegasus ponies. Whether they chose to stay or leave, they had looked too unique and distinctive with their armour and bat wings, and would have rapidly been identified and dealt with.

"If any of you wish to leave, and pursue your own lifes in relative safety and security, I won't think any less of you," she said, addressing all of them. "But, if you choose to stay and face continued danger as I go into hiding, then I won't stop you." She stood, watching them after that, waiting to see what would happen.

In the end, four of the guards decided to take the offer and leave, thanking the Princess for their trust in her as her guards, before flying off in different directions, returning home to ride out Solar Flare's crackdown as best they could. The remaining two, including Night Rider, shook their heads, vowing to stay by her side to their last breath, as they had sworn when they had become Night Guardians.

Giving the two an appreciative smile and nod, Luna turned to leave, but looked one last time over her shoulder as she took to the skies, flying away, planning to flee to some distant corner of Equestria. Her eyes swam with tears one last time as she saw Canterlot receeding into the distance, swearing she could still hear the distant screams of ponies as the Royal Guards starting taking away their freedom.

The land of Equestria was no more. Freedom and tolerance were dead values now. Order and oppression were the new values. Princess Luna knew, one way or another, this day would be remember for all history. Today saw the fall of Equestria...and the rise of the Solar Empire.

* * *

><p><em><strong>Author's Notes: <strong>Well, here's my first My Little Pony one-shot. I would like to take a little time out to explain this a little further, though, so hopefully you can endure my monologuing and read this to the end._

_From the moment I watched the episode "Luna Eclipsed", it became fairly obvious that Princess Luna was going to take over as my favourite character. I'm still holding out hope that we'll see more of her by the end of Season 2. Anyway, with my love of her character, I soon found out about the fan war of sorts between the fans of Princess Celestia and Princess Luna, which Luna fans tend to dub as the New Lunar Republic's rise against the Solar Empire._

_Personally, I've never had much care for the fan-war...I like both Princesses, even if Princess Luna is my favourite by a wide margin. But the concept was giving me ideas for stories, which over the last couple of months have grown. Me and my good friend (and beta-reader for Magic in the Stars) DiamondGirl400, we tested one of these ideas out in a simple roleplay scenario...and the idea promptly exploded._

_To put it simply, this one-shot is a side-story for a much larger, grander tale...a sort of test to see what you readers think of such a story._

_Here's my proposal: If you want to see the grand tale of the rise of the Solar Empire, and the efforts of resistance groups trying to return Equestria to the golden age it had once flourished in, let me know in a Private Message or review. If I see enough demand for the story, I will work on it alongside Magic in the Stars (which will NOT be put on hold, I will work on each project as my muse goes, hopefully updating each one with some form of regularity)._

_If the response turns out to be a little lacking, I'll keep my focus exclusively on Magic in the Stars, and file this idea away. Either way, I hope you enjoyed this one-shot. A huge thank-you goes to DiamondGirl400 for not only beta-reading this, but also for helping provide a lot of the inspiration for even this small one-shot!_


End file.
